You want government around when you're deciding whether to slice that store-bought tomato into your salad. You want government around in the form of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and its regulations, which are supposed to help ensure the safety of our food supply. You want, as you didn't have recently, the oversight of a regulatory third party that can tell you why you have come down with salmonella and what steps to take to avoid it.

Or better yet, you want an agency that can keep you from getting sick in the first place.

You didn't have any of that in the recent salmonella scare involving tomatoes — which, it turns out, might not have been the culprit that has sickened 1,300 Americans so far.

In fact, the offender might be serrano or jalapeño peppers grown in Mexico, but we can't quite be sure because, in the last few years, an army of lobbyists has successfully petitioned the FDA to back off and allow the agribusinesses that bring you most of your food to ease off the rigorous record-keeping.

So, in our new streamlined world, when people started to fall ill in April from what was obviously tainted food, the government could only issue weak suggestions that we skip tomatoes — and, lately, peppers.

As of Tuesday, the FDA was warning consumers against peppers grown, harvested or packed in Mexico. You can find out where your peppers come from, says the FDA's website, if you ask retailers or store or restaurant managers.

Hmmm. In the age of computers, it should take no longer than a keystroke to discover the origin of a piece of produce, which would have gone miles toward identifying the source of any food-borne sickness. This conundrum is especially troublesome because, if this is in fact the anti-terrorism White House, shouldn't we be rigorous in tracking our food sources? Just asking. Among others, a Michigan lawmaker (Rep. Bart Stupak) who's been investigating the FDA for over a year says so.

You also want government all up in your grill when you traverse one of our state's roads and you see an 18-wheeler, maybe barreling down Avon Mountain along with the rest of traffic. You want to know that that truck and its driver have passed government tests that make sure everything's safe, maintained, up to snuff. You want something more than an escape ramp that's designed to melt snow off itself. In the hope that that ramp is never used, you want trucks that work and drivers who know how to work them, and a regulatory agency — this time, the Department of Motor Vehicles — that ensures everybody plays nice.

You want to know that your safety is not in the hands of some bean counter somewhere looking for yet another way to cut costs, however infinitesimal that savings might be. Because sometimes it's the little things that count, like a truck's brakes. Or a clean piece of produce.

You want government to make sure that river levees are properly maintained, that mine owners are held to proven safety standards, and that toy makers — at home and abroad — aren't allowed to use paint with lead in it or parts small enough to get lodged in the throat of a child.

By all means decry the role of government in your life. It's utterly American to do so, but admit this: You want government around. In fact, you need government around because if your safety net is woven by an economic system, that's a tattered net at best.